III.

Next, a pleasant prospect is to be respected.-A medley view, such as of water and land at Greenwich, best entertains the eyes, refreshing the wearied beholder with exchange of objects. Yet I know a more profitable prospect,-where the owner can only see his own land round about.

IV.

A fair entrance, with an easy ascent, gives a great grace to a building.-Where the hall is a preferment out of the court, the parlour out of the hall; not, as in some old buildings, where the doors are so low, pigmics must stoop, and the rooms so high, that giants may stand upright. But now we are come to contrivance :—

V.

Let not thy common rooms be several, nor thy several rooms be common. The hall, which is a pandocheum,* ought to lie open; and so ought passages and stairs, provided that the whole house be not spent in paths; chambers and closets are to be private and retired.

VI.

Light (God's eldest daughter!) is a principal beauty in a building. Yet it shines not alike from all parts of heaven. An east window welcomes the infant beams of the sun, before they are of strength to do any harm, and is offensive to none but a sluggard. A south window in summer is a chimney with a fire in it, and needs the screen of a curtain. In a west window in summer-time, towards night, the sun grows low and overfamiliar, with more light than delight. A north window is best for butteries and cellars, where the beer will be sour for the sun's smiling on it. Thorough lights are best for rooms of entertainment, and windows on one side for dormitories. As for receipt :

VII.

A house had better be too little for a day, than too great for a year. And it is easier borrowing of thy neighbour a brace of chambers for a night, than a bag of money for a twelve-month. It is vain, therefore, to proportion the receipt to an extraordinary occasion; as those who, by overbuilding their houses, have dilapidated their lands, and their states have been pressed to death under the weight of their house. As for strength :

:

Пavdoxelov, "A house for the reception of guests, an inn."-EDIT.

VIII.

Country-houses must be substantives, able to stand of themselves. Not, like city-buildings, supported by their neighbours on either side. By "strength we mean such as may resist weather and time, not invasion,-castles being out of date in this peaceable age. As for the making of moats round about, it is questionable whether the fogs be not more unhealthful than the fish brings profit, or the water defence. Beauty remains behind, as the last to be regarded, because houses are made to be lived in, not looked on.

IX.

Let not the front look asquint on a stranger, but accost him right at his entrance.-Uniformity, also, much pleaseth the eye; and it is observed, that free-stone, like a fair complexion, soonest waxeth old, whilst brick keeps her beauty longest.

X.

Let the office-houses observe the due distance from the mansionhouse. Those are too familiar which presume to be of the same pile with it. The same may be said of stables and barns; without which, a house is like a city without works,-it can never hold out long.

XI.

Gardens, also, are to attend in their place.-When God planted a garden eastward, he made to grow out of the ground every tree pleasant to the sight, and good for food. (Gen. ii. 9.) Sure, He knew better what was proper to a garden than those who now-a-days therein only feed the eyes, and starve both taste and smell.

To conclude: In building, rather believe any man, than an artificer in his own art, for matter of charges; not that they cannot--but will not be faithful. Should they tell thee all the cost at the first, it would blast a young builder in the budding, and therefore they soothe thee up till it hath cost thee something to confute them. The spirit of building first possessed people after the flood, which then caused the confusion of languages, and since of the estate of many a man.

CHAPTER VIII.

OF ANGER.

ANGER is one of the sinews of the soul: he that wants it hath a maimed mind, and, with Jacob sinew-shrunk in the hollow of his thigh, must needs halt. Nor is it good to converse with such as cannot be angry, and, with the Caspian Sea, never ebb nor flow. This anger is either heavenly, when one is offended for God; or hellish, when offended with God and goodness; or earthly, in temporal matters. Which earthly anger (whereof we treat) may also be hellish, if for no cause, no great cause, too hot, or too long.

MAXIM I.

Be not angry with any without a cause.- -If thou beest, thou must not only, as the proverb saith, be appeased without amends, (having neither cost nor damage given thee,) but, as our Saviour saith, be in danger of the judgment. (Matt. v. 22.)

II.

Be not mortally angry with any for a venial fault.—He will make a strange combustion in the state of his soul, who, at the landing of every cock-boat, sets the beacons on fire. To be angry for every toy, debases the worth of thy anger; for he who will be angry for any thing, will be angry for nothing.

III.

Let not thy anger be so hot, but that the most torrid zone thereof may be habitable.-Fright not people from thy presence with the terror of thy intolerable impatience. Some men, like a tiled house, are long before they take fire; but, once on flame, there is no coming near to quench them.

IV.

Take heed of doing irrevocable acts in thy passion.-As the revealing of secrets, which makes thee a bankrupt for society ever after. Neither do such things which, done once, are done for ever, so that no bemoaning can hair grew again, but not his eyes. losses, others are never to be repaired.

amend them. Samson's Time may restore some Wherefore, in thy rage,

make no Persian decree which cannot be reversed or repealed; but rather Polonian laws, which (they say) last but three days. Do not in an instant what an age cannot recompense.

V.

Anger kept till the next morning, with manna, doth putrefy and corrupt. Save that manna corrupted not at all, (and anger most of all,) kept the next sabbath. (Exod. xvi. 24.) St. Paul saith, "Let not the sun go down on your wrath;" (Ephes. iv. 26;) to carry news, to the antipodes in another world, of thy revengeful nature. Yet let us take the apostle's meaning, rather than his words,—with all possible speed to depose our passion; not understanding him so literally that we may take leave to be angry till sunset; then might our wrath lengthen with the days; and men in Greenland, where day lasts above a quarter of a year, have plentiful scope of revenge. And as the English, by command from William the Conqueror, always raked up their fire, and put out their candles, when the curfew-bell was rung, let us then also quench all sparks of anger and heat of passion.

VI.

He that keeps anger long in his bosom giveth place to the devil. (Ephes. iv. 27.)-And why should we make room for him, who will crowd in too fast of himself? Heat of passion makes our souls to chap, and the devil creeps in at the crannies; yea, a furious man in his fits may seem possessed with a devil,—foams, fumes, tears himself; is deaf and dumb, in effect, to hear or speak reason; sometimes wallows, stares, stamps, with fiery eyes and flaming cheeks. Had Narcissus himself seen his own face when he had been angry, he could never have fallen in love with himself.

• COWEL'S "Interpreter," out of Srow's "Annals."

M

CHAPTER IX.

OF EXPECTING PREFERMENT.

THERE are as many several tenures of expectation as of possession, some nearer, some more remote, some grounded on strong-others on weaker reasons. As for a groundless expectation, it is a wilful self-delusion. We come to instructions how men should manage their hopes herein.

MAXIM I.

Hope not for impossibilities. For though the object of hope be futurum possibile, yet some are so mad as to feed their expectation on things, though not in themselves, yet to them, impossible, if we consider the weakness of the means whereby they seek to attain them. He needs to stand on tiptoes that hopes to touch the moon; and those who expect what in reason they cannot expect, may expect.

II.

Carefully survey what proportion the means thou hast bear to the end thou expectest.-Count not a courtier's promise-of-course a specialty that he is bound to prefer thee. Seeing compliments often-times die in the speaking, why should thy hopes (grounded on them) live longer than the hearing? Perchance the text of his promise intended but common courtesies, which thy apprehension expounds speedy and special favours. Others make up the weakness of their means with conceit of the strength of their deserts, foolishly thinking that their own merits will be the undoubted patrons to present them to all void benefices.

III.

The heir-apparent to the next preferment may be disinherited by an unexpected accident.—A gentleman, servant to the lord admiral Howard, was suitor to a lady above his deserts, grounding the confidence of his success on his relation to so honourable a lord; which lord gave the anchor as badge of his office, and therefore this suitor wrote in a window,—

"If I be bold,

The ANCHOR is my hold."